The French Fee System. 
85 
that it required all acts of notaries and other court officials to 
be registered, and fees to be paid for the same. Furthermore, 
the whole general subject was divided into three great classes. 
The first class was made to include all acts or documents which 
concerned or dealt with known values, and the fee for registra¬ 
tion was made proportional to the value. The second contained 
all acts concerning objects or matters having no definitely 
ascertained value, such as marriage contracts, wills, and the 
like. The charge on these was graded in amount, according to 
the income of the contracting parties, which in turn was esti¬ 
mated according to the value of their place of habitation. The 
last class included all merely formal acts, on which fixed 
charges were levied. This classification has remained essentially 
the same down to the present day, 1 but the administrative ma¬ 
chinery has been improved, especially during the revolutionary 
period. A Director G-eneral was then for the first time placed 
in charge of all verifiers, receivers, inspectors, directors, and 
other officials scattered over the various localities. 2 This 
centralized control and direct responsibility of subordinates to 
superiors has resulted in the efficient and economical adminis¬ 
tration of the entire system. 
The edict of 1789 created greater regularity and uniformity 
among the different charges than had ever existed before, but 
was soon followed by a whole series of changes, among the most 
important of which is the abolition of the antiquated and use¬ 
less feudal dues. The registration fees have been gradually in¬ 
creased, with the avowed purpose of increasing the receipts, un¬ 
til the enregistrement has become recognized in France as one of 
the most important sources of revenue. The system has been 
extended, until it includes almost every legal and extra-legal 
document and contract. In fact every document is supposed to 
be registered, unless it is expressly declared exempt in the law. 
New objects of registration have gradually been added to the 
list and new methods of measuring charges have been adopted. 
As an example may be cited the fees for registration of articles 
1 Block, Dictionnaire, p. 1013. 
2 Parieu, III, 110-134. 
